Top 5 Things Real Estate Agents Should Do to Enhance Their Marketing

Things that agents typically don't think about. I'll categorize it as this for your listener. These are things you don't think about and likely. And if you do go, well, what am I going to do about it? Because I don't really know what I'm supposed to do about it. So arguably everything I'm going to offer today are things that agents are probably not going to be able to just go and like a takeaway that I can go and implement tomorrow. You will likely need some help implementing it. And I would recommend that agents who, if any of this resonates with your agents, they should go back to you and get guidance on what to do next. Because these are important, these are really important, touchy-feely things that you don't realize just how important they are until you get it right.

And then you realize, man, what a difference that made. So like these are going to be things that have made a really big difference once they got attended to. Gotcha. So in no particular order, but I'll start with there's a technique in brand building and marketing, which no agent does, no broker does. Nobody does this in real estate except for like Zillow. It's customer journey mapping. It's a science. Like everything I talk about is basically scientific. I mean, you know, 1,000 watts of creative agency, but all of our creativity is born out of the science, not just pure creativity, but like there's a science behind it. So customer journey mapping is essentially sitting down and really thinking hard about the journey your customer is going on from the moment they decide they're going to either purchase a sneaker or buy golf clubs or buy a car.

Or buy real estate all the way to the very end. So what does that journey look like? So think of any journey has mile markers. So you begin to map the mile markers. And, you know, for an agent that may be, okay, that person is starting to search for homes. So you say to yourself, well, where do they typically go to search? And what happens when they find things? Like you're literally putting yourself through that science, figuring out every single step they take on their journey. And here's the reason why you do that. Because when you can come to terms with what your customer is doing, you should also think about what are they experiencing as a result.

Right. So, and it said, when you have all of that kind of figured out, you can sit back and go, okay, I am likely asking them to do things that they don't do, that they don't want to do. Because it would be antagonistic to the experiences that they typically like to have. So as an example, I'll give you a couple examples. If in my customer journey mapping, I realized that like most people go to Zillow or Realtor.com to search for property, why would I put a property home search as the main feature on my website? They're not using it. They're using something else. So that eliminates and opens you up to another possibility. What is Zillow not providing that I can provide?

So like you tie everything back to what you can be doing from like whatever you want to call it, service, experiential, marketing, because they're already doing that someplace else. Another example I want to give you, and this is what Asians really should be looking for, are the moments of pain and pleasure in that journey. There are many. That's going to be my question to you is the idea of walking through their shoes, is that to try to figure out where the pain points are? It's where the redundancy, it's three things. It's redundancy, which creates opportunity, and it's where the pain and pleasure. So when you, as an agent, can really earmark moments when pain occurs, you're now in a driver's seat.

Because if you can perceive pain and assuage pain in any way you can, well, you create a much better experience and you become more valuable. Like this is about, ultimately, it's about building value for yourself as an agent or your brand, however you want to think about it. But, so as an example, when you're working with a buyer, and maybe you're the type of agent that likes to send your buyer links to the MLS for listings you found for them. You should go to the MLS as a buyer and compare that experience with that of Zillow. Because that might earmark moments of pain. Because I've gone, my agent's done this, sent me links to like RMLS.

You go to RMLS, you can't even figure out where the photos are. It's all of this content smushed together. There's no UI, user interface at all. So, it's extremely frustrating. And so, what you have to do as a buyer is you've got to then grab the address and then go to Zillow, type it in so you can actually enjoy the listing. That's a moment of pain. Agents send pain all the time. Every time you send listings to the MLS, you're sending pain. Why do that? So, now that you know that, like, that's a problem, what solution can you come up with? And every agent can come up with a different solution. But, like, one example could be in the email you send with the links to the MLS, you could say, hey, Mark, here are three links to homes I think you're going to like.

I realize I'm sending you to our MLS. And I'm aware that their website looks like it's from the last century. But, the reason why I'm doing that is because all the data is accurate. Like, sell the benefit. But you could also then include a link to the listing. Like, do it for them. So, like, turning pain into pleasure. And find those moments everywhere. Because if you can get ahead of the moment and make your client aware that a moment of pain is about to occur, but here is my solution to soften that pain, you become the agent that, like, thinks of everything. It's like, I can, I think every agent can resonate with the fact that most of what the agent does that is of value is not seen by the consumer.

So, this is a way to reveal some of that magic, some of the empathy, some of the detail orientation that you have. Don't be lazy about this. The extra few seconds to write these emails or to grab a link make all the difference in the world. But while you're at it, while you're seeking moments of pain, turning them into pleasure, you should also look for the pleasurable moments. We're in moments where customers reap a jolt of pleasure. And how can you take that into moments of pure ecstasy? That is even better than, because most people are used to pain in real estate. It's a stressful thing. I'll give you another one. The minute an agent goes, okay, before you make an offer on the house, you need to get pre-approved.

Let me get you connected with my mortgage guy. That's a big pain point. It's one of the biggest pain points. First of all, pre-approval doesn't mean squat. Right. And an agent never says that. An agent never really explains what pre-approval is. So, especially a new buyer thinks pre-approval kind of means approval. And number two, when you send them to this mortgage guy, you are sending them away from your world and into that mortgage guy's world. And if you're not hovering over that handoff and being ever-present and making sure you're CC'd on everything and weighing in and representing your client, you're creating even more pain. So, you can make that pleasurable. But, like, when you find the moments of pleasure and amp it up and make it even more exciting, celebrate.

You celebrate moments. You know, like, an agent, a moment celebration is, like, at the very end, when it's all said and done, you give a client a bottle of wine. Like, it's too late. Right. It's too late. So, I'll give you an example. And these are just random. But, like, let's say you're taking, let's say you're one of those rare agents that still take people to view property. Okay, it's summertime. It's 110 degrees outside. You should have a towel. You should have suntan lotion. You should have bottles, not shitty bottles of water, nice bottles of, like, Voss water. Like, spend the extra dollar per bottle and give them something classy. Yeah. It doesn't matter, even if you're showing them, I don't know, a $60,000 mobile home in rural Texas.

Like, treat them. That's still their palace. Treat them like kings and queens. So, like, it's pleasurable to go out and view property. It's even more pleasurable when your agent has prepared a little kit for you to enjoy the outdoors. Maybe even a hat. And that hat could have your brand name on it. But, like, if they're going to go walking in the sun, hey, put this hat on so you don't burn yourself. So, customer journey. That would be number one. We call that, in our brokerage, we call that, we use the phrase, do four, not two. So, you're doing four people, you're not doing two people. Exactly. All right. So, do four, not two across the board. So, we did, over the course of six weeks, myself, Patrick, Natasha, and Jessica did customer journey mapping for us.

We tracked the moments clients signed a contract with us all the way to the end. And, like, we found a lot of pain points. Lots of moments where they get confused. They don't understand something. And it has really changed the experience that we've created. It is so valuable. But it's not something you do in an hour. Maybe you sit with your team and map it over time. Okay. So, that would be the first one. The second one I want to talk about is I think every agent should sit down and write out what I will call a worldview statement. I think brand foundation, if you're trying to build a brand or build a company or build a business or build anything, you are doing what everybody else does in your competitive space.

You sell real estate, they sell real estate. You're a broker, they're a broker. You sell shoes, they sell shoes. You sell coffee, they sell coffee. So, how do you begin to build differentiation? How do you even attract people to you? How many agents have worked with people they just wish they didn't have in their world who bring negativity? The secret to fixing all that starts at the worldview. The worldview is a statement that kind of can start with in a world where or in Erwin, where you go from there is you cite a problem that you as a business person perceived to be in the world. Not the grand global.

I mean, it could be. It could be the grand global world. It could be like in a world where people don't respond to other people. I mean, we get that today. You send somebody a text and like they never text you back. For sure. They never respond. Like that whole millennial mindset of like, yeah, I got your email. Why do I need to respond back to you? Well, in a world where whatever problem you as an individual perceive, we all have an individual belief system, a take on the world. You then end that sentence with in a world where this problem exists. We exist to make that a better world by doing X. OK, so whatever that worldview is, write it out and kind of flush it out, talk it out, think about it.

It's a statement that doesn't necessarily go public, but it becomes the foundation. It's your springboard. However, like you think about a pool and you go on a diving board, however springy that board is and how many times you jump on it will determine what your dive is. This is your springboard. Once you establish a really strong worldview, it leads to a belief system that you have about yourself, your customer base, your business in the world, and that becomes what you create your brand experience around. You build your service around that. You market around that. And like all of your advertising, all your marketing, all the things that you do should exploit that worldview.

And the purpose of that is, and this is kind of hard, it's not easy to do, but like in a world, I'll go back to a worldview statement. In a world where all agents are offering the same sets of assets on our website, search, buy, sell, and they're all helping people buy and sell homes. So, you need to figure out the place, the unique place where you fit in so that you can attract people to that side of you beyond just the service of buying and selling and listing and negotiating. Because we're all wired to become attracted to belief systems. And I want to give you like a part B to this. Anybody who's got a core value, sets of core values should ditch those.

Core values are not good enough. Would you want a core beliefs? Because beliefs are what you believe is who you really are. You might value something, but not necessarily live it completely, but you will live your belief system. And those belief systems could be beliefs about politics. They could be beliefs about education. They could be beliefs about service. They could be beliefs about pricing homes. I'm sure you have agents that will not take a listing if the seller has some crazy idea of what it's worth that is nowhere near what your agent believes it's worth. Like, that's a fundamental belief about fairness and transparency and doing right by the customer.

If that's your belief system, write it, establish it in something, you know, tangible, and then market and message and build your brand impression around your belief system. And then create core beliefs. So, like, you know, an example would be so many people put honesty as a core value. The reason why that is bullshit, if I can say that word, is because, of course, you're honest. Right. One would never expect... Even if I'm lying to you, I'm going to tell you I'm honest. Exactly. Like, even the mafia has honesty and integrity in their core value system. And so, honesty doesn't really mean anything. It's just a word. It's a table stake. It's expected. But if honesty, if you're, like, really, really honest and truthful, look for different words and then write a sentence.

That actually tells me... Give me an example. Like, just say something like, we will always say, we will tell you the truth no matter whether it hurts or not. So, like, whatever your statement is, if it gets me to go, wow, you're really honest, then you've succeeded in articulating what you value and what you believe. You don't have to come right out and say the word, but say a statement that paints a very clear picture of where you stand that forms an opinion in the consumer's mind. So, anyway, back to worldview. Worldview, it's your belief system. That becomes, like, the headline, some variation of what you believe. Like, your company, CBA Realtors, I've spoken to you many times.

You have very strong belief systems. But I'm not, like, I'm not yet fully aware of it if I land on your site within five or ten seconds. And so, as a brokerage that's doing something different in the marketplace, having that statement built out and then extracting a part of it and creating a headline that says what is a better world for people will attract more people to you. Like, this is how agents will generate better leads, better meaning people who are like-minded. So, let me ask you a question on this. Yeah. As a business evolves, does their worldview statement evolve, or is that a universal fundamental, you know, I know that you, because you and I have talked about this, I know that you are not a fan of Facebook. No, I despise it.

Right. So, Facebook started out with this worldview of connecting people. And now they've got this whole metaverse worldview. So, is it typical that as a brand or as a business evolves over time that that statement may change? Oh, great question. The statement may change, but here's the nuance to this. Your fundamental belief as a business should be so foundational and ironclad that the essence of it should never change. Like, you look at a brand like Nike. Their belief system has been the same belief system since day one.

They believe in athletics. They believe athletics is a pathway to greatness. And they believe that anybody setting out to do athletics should really set out to do it with their fullest, greatest potential to achieve that. So, if you're going to run, you might as well run to the max. If you're going to play basketball, you might as well try to become an NBA star. So, like, that is fundamental. Now, the stories that they tell to lift that belief system changes over time, over time, over time. But that core belief has never changed. Sometimes, though, to your point, beliefs expand. So, like, you can build on your belief system. Because as you grow as a business, as you grow as a human being, as you evolve as a spirit, you realize, like, oh, like, I didn't realize that 10 years ago when I started.

I want to add to my belief system. If your belief system changes entirely, well, that could be for two reasons. One is that your belief was never really fundamental to you to begin with. It was more like something you came up with because it sounded good, but it wasn't really truly you. Or the world has so completely changed and moved on that you kind of have to move with it. As an example, if one day all vehicles in the world are electric, then the Tesla worldview may have to bump up because, like, they've achieved. It's called the vision, right? Like, so from your worldview is where your vision, your vision, mission, purpose, promise statements come from.

They all come from your worldview. And if your vision statement is to one day imagine a world where, like, everybody in real estate is getting a fair deal. What happens when everybody in real estate is getting a fair deal? When that's just become the level playing field, well, then maybe it's time to bump up your belief system to, like, the next. You've got to find that next big problem that you're so, you know, riled up about. But arguably, that rarely happens. So you can shift the business model, but it should still be based on your belief system. You know, like Chance, you're a member of Inside. Inside's belief system is the same belief system as status or model. We believe that real estate is not given all of the best information from the best people all the time.

So we believe in a better real estate industry is as a result of collaborative efforts by good people with good ideas. And so, like, that's what led to Inside. What if we curate a bunch of really good people with good ideas? Could we all help each other become better? So the fundamental belief system is always the same, and it fashions everything you do. So if you're a Realtor and you go to a conference and you get, like, wowed by some, you know, silver bullet idea on stage, you need to just sit back on your ride home and go, does this help my worldview? Does this play into my worldview? Or is this way outside what I believe in? So when somebody is shouting at an agent, you should be doing TikToks, you go, okay, maybe I should, maybe I shouldn't, because maybe doing TikToks don't really play into my worldview.

Or if I'm going to do that, well, what can I do on TikTok that will sort of disseminate my worldview through that medium? Can I do that? There's a great lens by which you can measure how you appear to the world, which will attract, this is how you build brand. Like, think about Harley-Davidson. Or you say, you know, several times you alluded to the fact that you have acreage and you're on a tractor, and I'm thinking you're on the weekend on your John Deere tooling around your property. John Deere is an extraordinary brand that has a strong worldview. There are other tractor brands, but if you're buying John Deere, it's because you, whatever they project, you see inside you.

It's the same way with Harley. Like, the people who ride Harley-Davidson's kind of view themselves as they have an inner rebel, seeking moments of pure, unadulterated freedom on that bike. You can do the same thing on a Kawasaki, it just doesn't feel right. Right. It doesn't feel the same. Okay, so like, worldview is so critical in port. The other component to that, Chance, is what I call the point of clarity, and it's all part of worldview, but like in the same way that safety is very much synonymous with Volvo, or reliability is so synonymous with Honda, or why sustainability is so synonymous with a Tesla. It would be really cool for every agent to think of like what one word is the word that is synonymous with their service and brand experience.

And then once you come up with that word, you don't ever use it, but you market around it, you allude to it, you talk about it, you tell stories around it, you highlight people. And there are stories that play to that point, it's called point of clarity, but that's another way in which you create and distinguish yourself from all other Realtors, is you're not the Realtor that likes horses, or likes dogs, that's not enough of a point of clarity. But if let's say you like dogs, and you're posing with a dog, it's just a very low-hanging fruit concept, where else can you take that? Can you sponsor a shelter? Can you do, can you appear once a month at a shelter and give away puppies?

Like take it to the next, next level so that if somebody refers to you as a dog person, it's not enough. They take it to another step deeper and another step deeper until they really connect to where your heart really lies. And so like, again, it's not easy, this isn't easy stuff to do, but it's like, once you do it, and once you hone in on it and message and market around it, you just become so much clearer to the world, you will generate more business and more like-minded people and you'll have better experiences with your customers. Okay, the next thing is, I don't think agents segment their marketing. Everybody's got one database and they send everything to the entire database.

So, here I am in Portland, Oregon, I've never been to Houston, but maybe one of your agents is going to like what I have to say and want to put me on their emailing list so they can be on my radar. And they're going to send me email, I'm going to get your newsletter. Well, you don't know anything about me. The only thing you know is I live out of town. So, why would I get a just listed, you know, why would I get that? I sit here and I get them. I get all this stuff. And I'm like, well, why is somebody sending me? Here, I get a newsletter. Things that are happening this weekend in Charlotte. Like, I'm in Portland. I don't care. But maybe I could care. Maybe I am somebody who might be considering selling and moving out of where I live.

Agents should create a segment in their database called people who live outside of my area. And you should send them a different type of newsletter with different type of messaging. That begins with, ever consider living in a different place? Here's some activity about what's going on. But no, that doesn't happen. It's all one database. It's all getting the same thing. So, buyers get the same thing as sellers. Sellers get the same thing as buyers. Boomers are getting the same thing as millennials. And I know this takes work, but, like, it is so inefficient. And you do not maximize the potential of that database when you don't segment. So, I don't know. I think the solution is to figure out what products and programs you can use and maybe hire somebody for a couple of months to come in and build up and build out a database system for you through whatever MailChimp or Constant Contact or whatever newsletter service you use.

So, they're in, they're kind of working the plumbing and working the wiring and then they leave. But now you've got the tools to drive this yourself. But, like, the minute you start to think about your audiences and send your audience very specific. So, here's the thing. I live in Portland. And over the last 10 years, I have bought homes in five different states. So, that, I'm not alone. Other people look around the country, real estate opportunity. But a just-listed newsletter doesn't really say to me, you won't understand my need as an investor out of state. Right. That's what I'm saying to agents. Once you think about your worldview and how you believe people should be spoken to and the kind of service you want to provide people, take it down to, like, how you segment out your database and what you send to people.

So, your intent for them becomes that much clearer. Your place in their life becomes that much clearer. So, can I, can we pull the thread on that for a sec? Yeah, please. So, we have an argument a lot, more than you would probably think, about is content king or is just the fact that I sent you something king in a world where, you know, open rates and read rates are in the low single digits on email especially. You know, I recorded an episode from last week with Brian Gubernick with Homeward, and we were talking about the last time we had a market shift. And, you know, back in 2005, 2006, if I sent out a constant contact email, I got a 70% open rate because people would actually read your emails.

Today, if I get a 3%, I'm feeling pretty good about myself, you know? And so, the question becomes, how much of a content Nazi do you become from an effectiveness standpoint, from a return on investment in time and effort and all of that? Great question. I think you need to be the most Hitler-esque Nazi you can be when it comes to content. I also would highly recommend that you also become very conscious about my first idea, which is consumer journey mapping. The consumer is not waiting for your email. Right. They're not waiting.

So, when they get it, does it bring pain or pleasure? And why does it bring pain? And why does it bring pleasure? The reason why, and you know that we do a lot of research on this stuff. So, I can tell you what, and we've been doing this forever. I mean, I was doing surveys for the California Association of Realtors back in the early 2000s. On, like, every single thing agents do and what consumer, how they graded it. Even down to, like, pictures of Realtors on business cards versus not. I tackled everything. And I would continue to still do this today. Most of what comes through in a newsletter is of no interest to the consumer.

Right. And if I say to agents, what do you think the number one thing consumers are most interested in? They don't know. So, like, here you are marketing and you don't even know the very basic thing a marketer should know is, like, what is it that marketing is not just sending out. Marketing is all the intel inbound that you learn. It's the research you do on your customer to understand what makes them tick. So, I'll let you in on a couple of little secrets. The number one thing that consumers want to know from real, do you know what it is? I mean, from a seller, I would imagine it's what their home is worth today. That is a great answer. It's a great answer, and you're absolutely right. Sellers want to know what their home is worth.

Good or bad. They want to know, I own stock. I like to, I check my Robin Hood every day. I want to know where my equity is at. The other, so there's two things. You named one of them. The other one is souls. Everybody wants to know what's sold. And if you just sent out a list of here's what's sold last week, you will get them. And if you do that constantly, you become the agent that lets me know what's sold. I will open that email every week. It's the Zestimate issue, right? Everybody, every agent hates the Zestimate because it's always wrong, but it's there. Oh, you know what, Chance? Every agent should not only love the Zestimate, but get down on and kiss the ground the Zestimate was built on.

The Zestimate is the greatest thing ever for real estate agents. Because it's wrong. Because it's wrong, you should be more right, right? So like, here's an example. Here's a postcard, a postcard ID an agent can send out. Just sold. You put your list price, you put the Zestimate, and you put what you sold it for. And if you sold it for more than the Zestimate, you were right. The Zestimate was wrong. So use this Zestimate to just show how smart you are. It's, yeah, this universal hatred for things that appear to be enemies. I get, but like a thinking person should sit back and go, okay, it's my enemy, but it's here.

How do I use it to my benefit? So like, back to the email thing. If you're sending a newsletter with all sorts of stuff on it, you're not a newspaper, you're a real estate agent. Like, stay in your wheelhouse. You know, if my priest sent me a newsletter with tips on how to decorate my bedroom, I might question whether I wanted to find a different priest. So this gets to my next statement about this. Most real estate agents market their way out of their client's life. Over a period of time, listen, look at the stats. 85% of people love their agent right after the closure of a transaction, and 85% of those people hire a different agent for the next transaction.

Real estate agents market their way out of people's lives by virtue of all of the nonsense that they send, and the frequency by which they send that nonsense. Agents have been taught to market, market, market, market, send, send, send, make videos, make videos, just keep on content. There are a couple of content thought leaders in real estate that are like super cheerleaders around content. And they're like, everything you do in your life is content. No, it's not. Very little of what you do in your life is content. The only thing that's content is stuff your customer really wants from you and or the things that you believe in so strongly that you built your business and your brand around. So just keep sending that stuff.

And I don't know how to be more clear around that. And I know that your audience, so many people in your audience, because I've gone to this place on live audiences, and I've seen people shake their head and roll their eyes and say no. But I have the data to support this. I'm also like really skilled with this. I've been doing this my whole life. You know, the difference between me and a guy like Gary V is I don't curse a whole lot. So like, maybe I don't get taken as seriously. But like, trust me, the less you market, and the more singular your marketing is, and the more focused it is on one thing. And if it's the one thing you're known for, and if it's the one thing you know people want, you will have much greater success with it, even if you send it once a year. My tax accountant doesn't email me every week with an email newsletter.

But towards tax time, I will get an email from him saying, here are the top 10 things you need to know about this year's taxes. It's like, okay, perfect timing. Glad I got that. Okay, so like, not only should you segment your database, but you should be really careful how frequently you send people stuff, and how you package it so that the recipient understands where their value is in that send when they open it. Otherwise, it just gets deleted. And that's what's happening. When your open rate is 3%, what that really means is 90% of the, 97% of the people who received it deleted it. Because the subject line is wrong. You know, this is why there are marketing companies and brand companies and people you can hire to help you get this right, because it's not really your forte as an agent.

You have to market, but that doesn't mean just because you have to market and market that you're a marketer. Like really, stay in your lane. I know so much about real estate, and I will never, ever, ever do real estate without a Realtor. I'm not an expert at it. So like, try to just not be that jack of all trade, or the jane of all trade, and be the jane of the one thing you're great at, and get other people to get this right for you. The next, number four, I'm going to call. I got to stop you. I got to stop you before you go to number four, because I got to know the answer. All right. Yes or no to the picture on the business card? No. Thank God. I've been preaching that forever. Yes. No. It has never worked.

In fact, we did a series of tests, the same email. We sent the postcard. We mailed the postcard. 500 postcards. There was an A, B. A, had a picture of a Realtor, and an attractive-looking Realtor, male, female, and B, had larger copies, stronger copy, no picture. The pieces with pictures got no responses, zero. The pieces without a picture would get somewhere between 5% and 25% response. I get that some people are well-known faces in the community. The problem is, and this really dovetails into number four, the picture is never mindful of the moment.

And that's number four, which is be mindful of the moment. And here's what I mean by that. You're sending somebody a postcard about something that's just sold. Well, what is the star of that postcard? It's the piece that's sold, the picture of the house, the pricing. You put your picture on it, then it becomes about you. Now, humans are wired to look at humans. We always catch eyes. We're always looking at humans. There could be a picture of a beautiful sunset, but if there's somebody standing in front of the sunset on the beach, we are looking at that person. And what do people do when they look at people?

They break them down. He's too fat. She's too skinny. Blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. Look at that silly hat. Look at that stupid jacket. I mean, we're shallow, frivolous human beings. We do that. So why would you ever put, it's not about you. It's about, unless you're doing a brand campaign. If it's a brand campaign and it's about you, then maybe your picture belongs. That is the one and only time. But in every one of these postcard pieces that we did, it was always about it just listed or it just sold or about the community, about something. And the one without the picture got more because the picture creates a distraction in the force.

It distracts, it turns attention to the human. And if there is not a connection that you make with that other human, and it's rare that that happens unless you are a model, it becomes about you. You then fall into the stereotype that people have about real estate agents that you're all about yourselves. It becomes vanity. I know that's hard to hear. But it is the truth. Like, it's what the data tells us. So, you know, look, Chance, I've had these conversations and agents will absolutely stand firm. My picture sells me like, okay, fine. But do an A-B test. Just prove it to yourself. And if you're the one case example where your wonderful smile and your beautiful eyes and your red hat and green shoes and blue dress and black jacket work, well, then go for it, okay?

That's your thing. But, like, arguably, don't change your picture as often as you changed physically. So, well, you want to be the Realtor that has a picture on your business card of you 10 years ago, and then you want to sell yourself as honorable, as transparent. Like, that's a disconnect. So, if you're going to change your photo as often as you change, it's just like it sends the wrong signal. So, be mindful of the moment. I came across something the other day. My son was sitting on the couch with me, and I'm on my computer, and I'm going through something, and something popped up where I still had hair. And my son was like, is that what you look like? And I was like, yeah. Now, obviously, I need to change that because it's been a while.

If I showed up at an appointment, and somebody thought that I was going to be that guy, and I showed up with this, they wouldn't even recognize it. That happened to me. I waited in my car with my wife in front of a property, waiting for the agent to show up. Now, there was a woman standing in front of the house, but honestly, that woman was 20 years older. And I had her picture with me. Well, this was in California. So, this is 15, 20 years ago. So, when I finally got out of the car, and I said, are you Jill? And she said, yes. I'm like, in my mind, I'm going through a whole, what's wrong with her? She's living in the past. She's not really truthful with herself. She's not going to be truthful with me. Like, this is how consumers track. So, like, whatever, you're aging.

You're thinner. You're heavier. Like, own it. Own it. People will respect you if you respect yourself. If you're running from yourself, how are they going to respect you? If you're not truthful with yourself, they're not going to be truthful with you. They're not going to feel you're truthful with them. But the bigger bucket for this is really own the moment and be aware of the moment. So, you know, question. In 2020, in March of 2020, real estate was humming along. We read about some boat docked somewhere in America with some people that got sick on it. But as far as we were concerned, we were being told that's nothing that's going to disappear tomorrow. And we were all just going about our business. And then it became April. And all of a sudden, the whole world is, like, shut down.

We're in a pandemic. And then it's May and it's June. And for three months, real estate stopped and nothing happened. How many real estate agents went to their website and completely redid their website? How many of them redid their messaging and their marketing to capture the moment? And then all of a sudden, the moment changed. And even though we were in a pandemic, people were buying houses and real estate, like, erupted. And for two years, we've been listing homes and they sell before. We all know the story of the last two years. How many agents went to their marketing and went to their website, the number one destination where people go and created a, like, why would you have a search website? People weren't searching.

People were calling their real estate agent going, what just got listed? And what can I make an offer on this minute so I can get first in? Nobody changed anything. And now here we are. The market has come to kind of like a little bit of a stop or maybe a dead stop in some markets. And how many agents are capturing that moment and telling that story? Everybody's just humming along, doing the same thing you did last year and the year before and the year before and the year before. And I think that that is, I guess that's okay. You might look at it like, well, it didn't hurt me during COVID, didn't hurt me. Now I'm doing just fine. But it's doing just fine is that didn't hurt me then the best you can do.

Right. Because there are people who are actually taking advantage of those moments and they're killing it. And especially if we go into a recession, which I'm not, Chance, I'm not one of those people that buy into the media. I'm not in a recession yet. We're busy. You're busy. Your agents are busy. Yes, something's coming. The economy is changing. I should capture that moment. And if the moment does switch into a recession, I know this. Most people are going to go hungry and some people are going to kill it. And the people who are killing it are people who are taking advantage of the moment and redoing and retweaking their messaging and their marketing. They're sitting down with customers right now and talking to them about reality checks. Your home, like holding maybe a Zoom meeting on a Friday.

Let's talk about pricing. The world has changed. Whatever you decide to do to capture that moment and build awareness around your understanding of the moment so I can understand the moment. This can backfire very quickly on you, though, right? So we've seen examples of companies who have put something out in bad taste in a moment. Put something out or, better yet, scheduled something ahead of time and then something happens. And when that message goes out, it's just terrible timing. Well, you kind of have to be real careful with how you do it. So, for example, I went to college in a town that is the prison capital of Texas. It's where death row is.

It's all that. And whenever the next execution would come up, all the businesses would jump on board and, you know, they'd have killer specials and prices to die for. Things like that. And it just became like a quirky bit of the town because they knew there was going to be news media there and stuff like that. And it was just kind of their way of cracking wise. But we've also seen, like, during tragic times, people post things that trying to take advantage of a situation to drive traffic or whatever just comes off as distasteful. I've seen the same things. You're right. Yeah. I don't know if you know Scott Stratton, the unmarketing guy. He's got a book called The Book of Business Awesome.

And then when you flip it over, it's The Book of Business Unawesome. And it's people who really did a great job in a bad moment in social media. And then on the flip side, it's people who just did really bad. Yeah. The way I want to address this is going back to my second thing. If you're clear about your worldview, your belief system, see what you're describing, the people who do things in bad taste, what they're doing is they're chasing marketing. They're not messaging and marketing and storytelling based on their belief system. They're basing it on just shit happening in the world. Every day something's happening in the world. And we can look at a moment and go, wow, here's a moment we can capitalize.

There's nothing wrong with that. But the way you capitalized on it needs to then go back to what your belief system is. And I think if you stick true to your belief system and you build brand foundation, I mentioned earlier, vision, purpose, there's more than that. Chance, I'm going to do a webinar or a lounge in a couple of months on the entirety of brand foundation. So you'll get to see all the components, but it includes voice and tone. It includes attributes. It includes other personality components to the worldview that allow a marketer to sit down and go, okay, I want to take advantage of a moment. I see a shift coming, but how do I address it so I'm true to me and I just don't go off the deep end?

And I think you also need to be careful. Like there are just some things that are like going to trend in and trend out really quick. Like, and you're not a trend setter or a trend chaser, so you don't go after that. But like, let's just use a real tangible circumstance. The market's changing. The economy is, you know, impacting people's decision making. The war in the Ukraine is affecting the supply chain. Prices are going up. There's inflation. How should an agent touch on that without going off the deep end? Well, one way to do that is to like, this isn't the first time in history we're going through this. This is historical data. So an agent can go back and say, look, over the last 50 years, we've gone through four cycles.

So this can be a piece of marketing. It could be a blog post. I read a blog post yesterday about this that was brilliant. That just talks about the past trends and then add some nuances about today's current realities. And like, three things that you should do going forward. And they were simple things. Operate with caution. You know, like, they were sensible things that will never get anybody in trouble because it's just good advice. I think if you always stay kind of close to your vest, I mean, if you're one of those like excitable, dramatic, hyperbolic people, you're likely going to get yourself in trouble no matter what. True. But if you're smart, if you're building a real, listen, if you're in real estate, I'll address this to your list, the listener.

Guys, you're all, you're in real estate, which means like you're in the financial business. You're in the housing business, whether or not you're serious people or humorous people or fun people, the business you're in is serious business. There's so much at stake. So, like, run your operations with the least amount of drama. Hold back on the drama. Like, you could be internally freaking out. I mean, we're, any one of us who are parents know that there are moments raising our kids who are freaking out, but we can't let the kids know it and see it and feel it. They got to think everything's calm and we're in charge. So, like, your clients need to see that same thing. So, keep yourself in somewhat of a reserve.

And, I don't know, if you're about to put something out, show it, like, I don't know, Chance, can an agent send you a piece of marketing saying, Chance, I'm thinking of going out with this next week. Can I just get your eyeballs on it? Like, I mean, you know, you guys have one of the smartest brokers that I've met in real estate. Like, tap them before you go out there with something a little bit edgy. But, here's another side to capture in the moment. I saw an article, I mean, an ad, an agent from our inside group sent me an ad last week. Oh, they posted it live on the thing, but, like, I chose to speak to them one-on-one because they needed many, many changes. But the ad was all about a topic, but then the image was an image of the husband and wife team.

And it had nothing to do with the topic. So, this is what I mean by part. The moment is the moment that piece of marketing is about. So, if the moment is about listings, then there should be an image of a house. Or no image. Just highlight the copy more. But there shouldn't be. This particular piece of marketing was a little bit more on the serious side. And the image of the agents were, like, one of those candid, fun images of the agents, kind of, like, running along, holding hands. There's a beautiful photo of them. But, like, it was completely the wrong temperament for the ad. So, this is about, I know you want to advertise yourself or I know you want to do, but, like, is it the right moment?

So, look at your pieces and just think about the whole thing in its entirety. Break each piece up in separate components and make sure that they all capture the moment in the best way it can and has the right temperament. Exploits your belief system. You can't go wrong with that. And if the moment changes three weeks later, then put out a new piece of marketing that flips and goes with the next moment. There's nothing wrong with that. Moments are changing all the time. Sure. But as long as it's consistent with the other things we've talked about, like worldview. 100%. Then tone and temperament and just always stick to the same. Then that's how you build trust. By always being consistent in your headlines, in your tone, in your messaging.

Your messaging can't be one month, it's, like, overdramatic and overexcited and super excited and hyperbolic. And then the next month, it's, like, serious and, you know, stoic and, like, in the reserve. And you've got to find a consistent tone of voice. Right. I think the last thing that I want to talk about is, and I kind of touched on all this, is just how important marketing is. It is so important, but it's not about velocity. It's about substance. Less is more. Across the board. Unless you're really trying to become a thought leader, stop trying to become a thought leader. If you're trying to be a celebrity, well, then go for it.

But if you're not a celebrity, don't try to be a celebrity. Don't buy in to all of the marketing gurus that are telling you to just keep throwing stuff out there. I'm telling you, as an inbound intel researcher, the consumer is inundated with marketing. On an average, ask yourself this question, because you don't realize this. But if you're commuting to work or you're surfing the Internet during breakfast, how many ads, what ad did you remember? Odds are probably none. And you may have seen over 100 ads flash by you. Our inboxes are, look at your inbox. Look at your, if you're using Google, look at your promotion and social tabs. They're filled with stuff.

We're inundated. I think less is more. I also think that, like, yes, email marketing is great. I love email marketing. I'm not a big social media guy. I think, once again, our social media channels are so inundated with content that isn't very good, that most people are scrolling, but they're not paying attention. But you know what? Everybody loves to get a personalized letter in the mail. And I have never, really, ever abandoned the power of a beautifully written, nicely delivered piece of mail. Make it not look generic. And there are wonderful ideas that I've had over the years about, like, how you can make your envelopes interesting and how you can make the letters interesting.

Yeah, I know it's extra money, but, like, that stuff pays off. So I think that, like, I said this earlier, solds are the number one thing. People want, so you guys should be looking at CloudStreams or RealScout or, I don't know, Chance, maybe you've got software inside of your back-end system that does, you know, the email platform for your agents, but, like, just sold, sold. Like, what you said, what's my home worth and what is just sold in the market? With, like, a little bit of, like, what's your opinion on it? And so, like... Engagement creation, right? It's, because you tap it, that's candy. That's what people want. And don't go often.

Your accountant doesn't email you every week. Your doctor doesn't email you every week. So hang on. Going back to what you just said, because I think I may have misunderstood something. Okay. So you said it, and what's your thoughts on it? Are you asking what your thoughts are from the recipient in order to create engagement, or are you giving your opinion on it as the expert? All right. So that's a great question because you alluded to something I did not include. I think when you send solds, they should just not be sold. Here's 10 properties that sold. I think that an agent should write some opinion about the climate of these sales. Based on last month's data, these homes sold 10% less in value over last month.

Or some... I'm not an agent, so I don't have... But, like, don't just send pictures with prices. That's something anybody can do. Write something. Provide an opinion. In a world where, like, agents think, oh, people are going to hire me because I pose with my dog, and I like dogs, or I pose with my horse, and I like horses, people actually will hire a horse agent if they don't like horses because the agent's got an opinion about things that matches my need for information. So put something down. But I think, to your point, if you can put in a call to action, what do you think about what's going on in the market? Do you need more information about what's going on in the market? Let me know. Click here. Contact me. That is awesome.

Like, that is a very valuable... You're seeking engagement. Seek engagement. Because when people get this stuff, how could you not think that they might not have some questions? So make yourself... Figure out what is the best way, and don't always just go to a form. A form may be the worst way for people to communicate. Send me a text. Like, honestly, like, the closer you can create connectivity, and the more personal you can be, people relate... Look, the bulk of agents I meet are really great people, people. They like people. They like to be with people. And everything that technology has created over the last 15 years has done nothing but to separate those people from people.

So if you're one of those people, people, your thing should be, text me and get a text. How cool is it to wake up in the morning and see a text somebody sent you? Or during your day, you get a text from somebody. Just, you can say to somebody you're with, hey, I just got this text. I just need to say I'll get back to you in 20 minutes. It's the best thing. Like, once you know your belief system, once you really are clear in who you are and what you believe, then do things to create environments that offset that belief or sell that belief. So if you want people to know that you really care about people, a form to fill out to contact you doesn't say that. So where I want to go on part B on this is I'm going to open up the biggest can of worms here.

And so maybe we can talk about this in another podcast, but I'll just be if we touch on it. If you're trying to build a personal brand, stop doing that. There's no such thing. It doesn't exist. It's a fabrication. It's a fabrication of marketers in the last 20 years. And people who you think are personal brands are not. Kim Kardashian is not a personal brand. She's a brand. Elizabeth Taylor is not a personal brand. She's a brand. Yes, she's a celebrity who is behind the brand or in front of the brand, but it's a brand. The idea that you can build the personal brand is based on the notion that whatever your persona is, it's going to be consistent 100% of the time.

And you know what your persona is. But the truth is, we are all collection of about eight or nine different personas. On any given day, a happy person could not be having a good day and could be a little sad. Trying to build brand on that personal persona means you have to be that 100% of the time. And there's no way you can. It's not possible. Not unless you have somebody who is managing you, who can dress you and look at every word you say. So why do that? Instead, be a brand brand. It's easier to be a brand brand. So it means removing your persona out of it a little bit and building in the stuff I've been talking about, which is belief system and point of clarity and worldview.

If you try to embody that within your persona, then you have to sell people on your persona. And that's really hard to do. It's also, it's not valuable. A personal brand is not as valuable if you want to sell your business one day as the brand. So we can, Chance, we could talk endlessly about this, but I would just say like in the world of marketing and branding, these are two separate things. If you build it on a brand foundation and a personal brand foundation, and I know there's probably going to be a million questions around this, and the best I can offer is if anybody has one of those questions, email me. I'm happy to answer them. Just like focus on where your brand lives in the world and what you believe in about all things.

What do you believe about email frequency? What you believe about marketing? What you believe about all these things, but how people should get in touch with you and just build brand around that. And those make up my five core things that are not easy to execute tomorrow. But if you want to become a more valuable, successful, distinguishable entity in your marketplace, these are the must-dos. Awesome. That's fantastic. So just to review, customer journey mapping, we're looking for pain, we're looking for pleasure, we're looking for redundancy. Having your worldview statement. This isn't a core set of beliefs. It's not a core values. It's not anything like that. This is in a world where. In a world where. This is the villain.

And I am the hero to slay that villain. You know, on that note, good question. Why did you become a real estate agent? What was missing in the marketplace that you felt you could bring to the marketplace that didn't exist? There's many different ways into that. But always think about the hero villain, the good versus bad, good versus evil story. You know, it's Star Wars, the greatest sort of expression of Jungian art types and the battle between good and evil. But in a world where, you know, there was the dark side, the good side was fighting for freedom for all beings across the galaxies. Like, create one for yourself. It's really wonderful and fun to do. And so that's, yeah, that's number two. Okay. Market segmentation is number three and understanding, you know, who we're sending what to.

And tying into that number four is being mindful of that moment and messaging to it. And then understanding that less is more, that substantial marketing is more important than just marketing and branding go hand in hand. They're two sides of a coin. If you're building a brand, then the marketing needs to, the marketing is your, the marketing sells the brand and then your branding sells the brand. So like they're two separate things, but they work hand in hand together. And it's, it's five of like, I don't know, many, many, many things, but I felt like these would be my Top 5. Because it's called the Top 5 show. So it needs to be your Top 5. My email address is mark, M-A-R-C at thousandwatt.net.

And here's my brand promise. If you have a question, I will answer it. I won't sign you up for my blog. I don't sell you services that doesn't exist. I will simply answer the question. And if it's too hard of a question that would actually require like significant work, I will recommend that you go find somebody to help you do that. But in most cases, I can look at something and, and put my eyes on and go, I don't know. That's the, it could be better. But like, we built our firm to make this industry better. And I don't know where the boundary to that ends. So like if 50 of your agents send me an email asking a question, I'm going to answer all 50 emails.

While you're at it, go to 1000Watt, that's the number 1-0-0-0-Watt, W-A-T-T.net and sign up for their newsletter because it's great. I have been a subscriber to y'all stuff for a really long time. Yeah. I look at, one of the cool things about doing this podcast over the last few years has been some of the people that like I followed when I went, I stole their stuff when I was trying to just establish myself as a solo agent, 12, 13 years ago, you know, Chris Smith, Jimmy Mackin, Jay Thompson, you guys, I've gotten to know now through all of this, you know, back when Chris Smith was tech savvy agent and they were just, you know, talking about using an iPad and do some of that.

I came from that world. These were my, you know, counterparts. I'm still friends with Jay. Jimmy and I spent two hours yesterday talking. I did too, man. Like the bulk of my knowledge is based upon nobody's making anything new up. We're all learning from each other. But, you know, like I think real estate went through a very interesting sort of Renaissance period in that 2005, 2008, when blogging became the thing and people with credibility, something to say, had a moment in time where we were the only ones doing it and had an audience. Now everybody's, right?

Everybody's a publisher. Now everybody's writing. So maybe that would be my number six bonus takeaway here is start becoming a little more selective about who you subscribe to, but like, listen, Jimmy Mack and Chris Smith, they're still putting out amazing content. I'm not a big fan of Tom Ferry's social content, but I'm a huge fan of Tom Ferry, Jason Pantana. They have great information. Maybe get a coach or a marketing person to really help. But like, there's some, we are still in an era where there's some really great content, but it's kind of like buried amongst a lot of not so great content. I got my start on Madison Avenue in New York, working at an ad agency.

Like my teachers, my mentors were all about less is more and impact. It's all about impact, make impact and show up less. When you show up and it's not that often, you make impact. It's like, oh, they must have something to say. If you're saying too many things too often, people just go deaf to you. Well, good conversation, man. Absolutely. Thank you. I appreciate the time. I know it's valuable and this has been great. I'm excited about getting it out to everybody. So thank you, Mark. Thank you for watching. We'll be back next week with another episode of Top 5.